Thank you for the info. It's something to think about. The evidence we've found about John & Mary Boon Couch they were in VA (we feel western VA) in 1774. That is the same year of Lord Dunmore's War. While a little later, down on the VA/NC border counties, Robert Benge, s/o Trader John and Chickamauga Cherokee Wurteh, was waging his own war against the white settlers there. It is recorded my James T Lewis (don't know if was Sr. or Jr - one would have been in early 60's, the other early 20's) was present when Bob Benge was killed in 1794 by the whites. Another ancestor, Edward Callahan, married into the Cherokee's with his marriage to Susannah aka Mahala Brock. They managed to escape with their scalps intact, but had a negro slave kidnapped by "the Bunch", as Bob Benge was called. I found a court record where Edward & "Sukey" had been hauled into court for not having taken the "vows of marriage". Well, maybe they had a Cherokee marriage. I don't know if they ever married according to white man's laws. Joyce